Someday, Somehow
by holygoof101
Summary: Even when you have a 1000 different stories you could tell sometimes a trip home can really open up your eyes. Finncentric Finchel future oneshot


The night sky is starting to change on him. He knows the lighter it gets the closer to daylight it is. It's a scene that's all too familiar to him. It's honestly become a scene he's tired of seeing. He can't exactly place when sunrises lost their appeal maybe it was when he spent his 21st birthday on the phone, or the Thanksgiving in a dingy diner in the middle of nowhere eating an over cooked hamburger, or the Christmas he wasted in a van driving through Iowa. Fucking Iowa where there's not even Christmas lights to see, just nothing to look at but miles and miles of freaking corn. He's not sure when sunrises lost their appeal he just knows it was a long time ago. The speedometer reads 87 miles per hour as he flies past yet another mile marker. This one tells him he's got seventy miles until he's reached his destination. He pushes his foot down a little harder on the gas pedal. He's got seventy miles until he's home.

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It's just before daylight when he pulls the car into the driveway. The porch light is lit and he can see the light is on in the kitchen. She's expecting him so he knows that's why she's up. He can't help but wonder how many nights she's spent waiting for him to come home only to have him call and tell her he wasn't going to make it. Thinking about that kinda makes him feel like an asshole. He tells himself it's the times he's made it home that count and he wishes he could make himself believe that.

The smell of pancakes hit his senses as soon as he opens the door. He drops his bag by the stairs and makes his way to the kitchen, softly clearing his throat as she comes into his line of view. "Hi, Mom." He watches as she jumps and tries to pretend like she wasn't waiting for him to get home.

"Finn! You're early! I didn't expect you for hours." He's not sure if this is a lie or the truth but he knows the pancakes and the her being up at 5 in the morning is all for him. He's not sure if he's happy about this or pissed off at himself over it. Her arms squeeze around him and her hands run down his face and he listens as she tells him he's getting to skinny while she pushes him into a kitchen chair and begins throwing food in front of him. He knows she worries about him but he wishes she wouldn't.

"It was a long drive mom; I really just want to get some sleep." He mumbles as he picks at the pancakes in front of him for a few more minutes before he stands up and kisses her cheek while putting his plate in the sink.

"How long are you staying for?" She asks. He knows that tone. It's the tone with a little too much hope in it. It's the tone that used to be happy for him, now all he hears when she asks that question in that way is the disappointment that's bound to follow.

He shrugs in response, "A couple of days. We have a show in Chicago on Tuesday. Figure I'll ask Kurt if he wants a ride home."

"Oh, well your room is exactly how you left it. Except the sheets are clean." It's then he sees it, it's just a flash of emotion across her face but he knows what it is. It's the disappointment he hates seeing. He knows she's proud of want he's accomplished. He knows that somewhere she's got obscure magazine covers framed and copies of albums she gives out to anyone who will listen. But he also knows that she wishes his life was more stable and normal. That he could be around more, that by this point in his life he was supposed to have a wife and a house and things he could call his own and maybe even have given her grandkids. He knows the life he lives isn't what she would have planned for him. But hell it wasn't what he'd planned for himself. Probably because he'd never really planned anything for himself. Well except one thing and the life he ended up with blew that to hell, so he just stopped trying to plan at all.

And the not planning may be working out but he's not going to lie and say it doesn't get lonely sometimes. He's got the guys in the band but hanging out with them night after night sometimes it feels like he's stuck in the movie with Bill Murray where he keeps waking up on the same day over and over again. And sure he meets hundreds of people a week but really there's only about five people in the world he calls friends.

He lets out a sigh as he walks into his old bedroom. Just like mom said it was exactly like he left it. Like walking into a time capsule that's like ten years old. Same old band posters. Same books on the shelf that are mostly books he never read. The same pictures are still on his desk. A half smile crosses his face as he picks one of them up. It's a group picture from Glee club, their senior yearbook photo. It was the first year they all agreed to take the damn thing. Funny how the five people in the world he still considers his friends are all in that photo and yet he hasn't seen any of them in at least two years and most of them he hasn't seen in about ten. And one of them well he doesn't want to think about her. He's sure she stopped waiting on him a long time ago.

The picture goes back on his desk in the exact place it was before he picked it up. Nothing in this room ever changes. He's not sure if that's sad or refreshing but either way at least for the moment it feels good to be home.

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There's an unofficial reunion the night before the reunion at some dive bar in downtown Lima. They didn't all graduate together but they did all sing together. It was actually Brittany's idea something about missing her family since they couldn't all make Lord Tubbington's funeral.

The bar looks all too familiar to him; it looks like the inside of the hundreds of crappy bars his band played in before they got a chance to start playing decent bars. Kurt's supposed to be on his way but Finn's pretty sure he's the first one there because the place is empty except for a few people in the back shooting darts. This is good because he's pretty sure he wants a drink or two before he has to see anyone. It's not that he's expecting the situation to be stressful or he needs to drink to be social he just... Well he has an idea of how this is all going to go for him and well he wants to have a drink first.

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And it goes down exactly how he expected it to. Slowly but surely everyone started pouring in. There were hugs and handshakes and introductions.

Quinn's last name isn't Fabray anymore, it's Bertman. He didn't expect that to weird him out but it did just a bit. Like the first girl he ever thought he loved had like a whole new name. Mike and Tina came in and started showing off pictures of their babies. To which Puck whipped out his own wallet and started flashing pictures of his son and giving out business cards for his contracting company. Santana couldn't make it in person, something about lobbying in D.C. but she made sure to Skype in via cell phone and throw around a few snarky remarks and a few laughs.

Slowly but surely everyone else starting pouring in and there were more hugs, handshakes and introductions. And then she was there. He expected her to make some grand entrance, draw all the attention in her direction. But she didn't. He looked over his shoulder to see where Sam had gone and there she was standing by the bar introducing some guy to Mercedes. He tried not to watch. He tried not to notice the way her hand grazed over the dude arm. He tried not to hear the sound of her laugh as Mercedes lightly slapped the guy in the arm but it was like every other sound in the room went mute. Like no one else was even around and all the air was slowly being sucked out of the room and he needed to get out. He needed to get out right then. So he did. He finished his beer and quickly excused himself from the table trying not to be noticed as he slipped out onto the bar's back patio.

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He's not sure how long he's outside before someone comes to find him.

"It's strange watching all you kids drink." Mr. Schue's voice says as he holds out a beer to Finn and sits down next to him. "The having kids, the careers, all of that. That's not so strange but its strange being at a bar and watching all you kids drink. I wonder if it's going to feel this strange when mine get to be drinking age."

He's not sure what to say he knows that's like Schue's way of trying to get him to like open up but he's not sure what to say, so he shrugs and sips his beer and yeah Mr. Schue is right it's a little weird because he feels a little weird drinking like right in front of him. "It'll probably be different because we're not like your real kids."

"You kids were more than my kids. I don't think any of you realized how much you guys really did for me. You're as much my kids as my own and I'm proud of all of you. Every one of you, Finn."

That's it. Right there. That's it. He's not used to hearing that anymore, at least not without the disappointment that follows. He blows out a scoff through his nose, and closes his eyes. "Everyone else in there has something. Someone. They're accomplished, settled, they got it figured out. And if they don't they at least know what they want to be when they grow up. What do I have? A room at my parent's house with a bed that stays made about 340 days a year and a story about how there's a bar in Utah where you perform inside a cage because they have to separate the bar from the stage? Stories. That's what I got. I don't have a house or kids. I don't even have a dog. I have a band that while were successful we'll probably never be huge and stories. Stories about crappy bars and bad diners and the girl I couldn't ask to wait for me anymore..."

The words come out bitterer than he meant them to but it's the truth. Rachel had her life figured out at five years old; she knew exactly what she wanted and where she wanted to end up. So he couldn't ask her to keep waiting for him to figure it out. And he couldn't keep watching the disappointment on her face every time he packed a bag to leave again. He couldn't keep listening to the sigh that followed every time she asked when he was coming home and he didn't have an answer for her. It was just too hard and she deserved to find someone who knew what they wanted because he still didn't know. But that didn't mean he didn't miss her. It didn't mean he didn't wish he could have figured it out for her.

"A girl I'm still singing songs about. A girl I've been singing songs about since I was seventeen." Finn finishes his beer and drops the bottle with a loud thud against the table. "Doesn't seem to matter now, she's got plenty more than stories."

"Life is just one big story Finn. And the best part is that the ending... Well the ending is always changing."

He knows that voice; it's soft and definitely not Mr. Schue. He knows that voice and he knows that tone. His eyes slowly open and look to the chair next to him. For a moment he lets himself get lost in the deep brown eyes looking over at him. For a moment, just a moment, he forgets all of the stories. He forgets all the empty phone calls. For just a moment as he's looking at her again, as she's there beside him just the two of them, he feels like he has it figured out. But it's just a moment. He breaks the eye contact and rolls his empty beer bottle over the table. "Guess I'm still trying to figure out my ending."

"Me too." She says and he watches as she licks her lips and leans over to rest her head on his shoulder.

It feels natural. It's been years and it still feels natural to sit with her like this. His logic keeps telling him it's just a moment but he wants to hang on to it. He wants to write songs and songs about this moment. He doesn't want to ever leave this moment. He doesn't want it to follow with disappoint or emptiness. He just wants to stay here because this feels like what it's like to have it figured out. And now he feels the pangs of disappointment because he wishes he'd figured this out before it was too late.

But he can't change it now so he's going to hold onto this moment. And he sure as hell isn't going to the actual reunion tomorrow to have it all ruined for him.

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Kurt tell him later that night that the guy who came with Rachel was her co star. Her gay co star she brought because she refused to go to the reunion alone and she wanted to introduce and try to set him up with Kurt. Something Kurt adamantly explained wasn't going to happen after the last disastrous time she tried to set him up with someone.

All of that might have made a difference if he hadn't had that moment with Rachel outside the bar. He just doesn't want anything to taint that moment. Besides he didn't really want to go to the damn reunion anyway.

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The flowers that used to be in front of the house are gone. It's been paved over with a new walkway and all new landscape. He hadn't noticed that the day before and he wonders when it changed. He wonders when a lot of things as he tossed his bag into the back seat of the car.

"Are you sure you don't want to stay for the actual reunion?"

"I've already seen everyone I needed to see. Are you sure you don't want a ride to Chicago?" He responds to Kurt's question. He knows Kurt knew the answer when he asked the question. Just like he knows the answer Kurt will give him. They may not see each other but they still know each other.

"Unlike you I enjoy these social outings and look at them as an opportunity to throw my success in the face of those lesser. Take this though." He watches as Kurt holds out some kind of book at him.

"I can't read while I'm driving Kurt."

"Just take it! And drive safe."

He coughs as the book hits him in the chest and then takes a glance down at it. He knows who it came from. There's no doubt in his mind who it came from because it's a binder with a large gold star on the front of it that his brother just shoved into his chest. He takes the binder and quickly gets in the car because he doesn't want to know about it. If it's filled with empty dreams or more disappointment that's something he'll deal with while he's by himself.

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He's making his first stop for food before he can bring himself to think about the binder sitting in the passenger seat again. But once he thinks about it, it taunts him until he pulls off at the next exit to look at it.

Postcards.

Its plastic sleeves filled with postcards from all over the country. Every postcard he'd ever sent her. The first one from the show in Pittsburg, to the one he sent her two weeks ago in Minneapolis. Every damn post card he'd sent was in that folder in a clear plastic sleeve so she could see the picture and read what he'd written on the back. They were all there. He recognized every one. Everyone except the last. The last one was a picture of the Brooklyn Bridge; he had never sent that one. That one wasn't from him. He knows because he never sent her a postcard from New York City that just seemed kinda dumb when she like lived there and everything. Plus there had been a couple of times he had been in the city and didn't want her to know he was there because he just knew he wouldn't be able to handle seeing her.

But there it is. A postcard from New York City on the last page all by itself. A lump formed in his throat as he flipped the page to see what it said on the back. It wasn't his hand writing but he recognized it. It was two simple words in big girly loopy letters and punctuated with a gold star that he knew all too well.

"Someday, Somehow."

His eyes lifted from the book and looked out at the interstate. His fingers turned the ignition as he turned the wheel and hit the blinker. He could hear her voice louder than any thought he'd ever had. "Someday, Somehow."

~FIN

A/N: Title and a good portion of the story inspiration come from the song Someday, Somehow by Every Avenue. There are about 550 shout outs I should give here but they know who they are. Also once again I guess I'm just a lone wolf because this one is unbeta'd so slack is to be cut. Read, review, and I hope you enjoy. One day I'll stop writing from the dark and twisty place.


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